


What It Is To Burn

by etonnant67



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Small Town, Angst, Arson, First Love, M/M, Pining, not quite linear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-12
Updated: 2018-02-12
Packaged: 2019-03-17 05:32:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13652448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etonnant67/pseuds/etonnant67
Summary: Maybe all that matters is for Chanyeol to burn.





	What It Is To Burn

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea floating around in my head for like 5 months so I decided to finally fucking write it. It's not quite what I originally had in mind but I wrote it so I published it. It's weird. So yeah. Sorry?

It almost seemed like magic, that first time.

 

Chanyeol didn’t know that anything could be so bright, could catch so fast, could burn so _hot_. He’s standing there, bathing in the blazing light, letting the heat wash over him, letting the smoke tighten in his lungs. He watches the sparks float up from the wreckage, almost graceful in their frantic rise. It had all been so easy--so easy to listen to the low rumble of Kyungsoo’s whisper, gentle like a late night summer storm; so easy to settle into the rough upholstery of Kyungsoo’s old, creaking Ford; so easy to let him drive them around their tiny, shithole of a town; so easy to trace the old, cracked roads with the glare of the headlights; so easy to follow Kyungsoo out of the car and help him carry the sloshing jugs of gasoline up the weed covered hill to the abandoned, crumbling farmhouse; so easy to douse the old wood, covered in peeling paint; so easy to take the matches out of Kyungsoo’s outstretched hand; so easy to listen to him when he said “you first”. It had been so easy. It had felt unreal.

 

Chanyeol remembers feeling the sting of the smoke and ash, the feeling of tears gathering in his eyes and he remembers breathing in, deeply, trying to inhale some part, any part, of this.  He remembers the grip of Kyungsoo’s hand, his fingers hot like embers against his palm--somehow, hotter than the flames writhing in front of them. He remembers glancing sideways at Kyungsoo, his profile illuminated in the light, his mouth set in a tight line, his eyes hard, the orange-red of the fire casting gold glints against his ink black hair and reflecting in his glasses. He remembers squeezing Kyungsoo’s hand, as if he were trying to hold on to him. Like Chanyeol was afraid that Kyungsoo would crumble like ash and fall through his fingers.

 

\---

 

It’s a slow, hot summer.

 

The days slip by in short bursts, each moment dip dyed red and yellow by the glow of the sweltering sun. Chanyeol spends his days doing the two things that everyone else in their town does during the long dog days of summer. He sits. He sits on his porch, watching the road, empty of cars; he sits in the stuffy darkness of his living room, watching the flickering motion of his television; he sits on the edge of his unmade bed, staring at the pale green walls. He waits. He waits for the sun to sink into the ground. He waits for the air to cool, for the phone to ring. He waits for something, anything to happen. He waits for Kyungsoo.

 

Kyungsoo doesn’t come home at the same time every night-- sometimes, he comes just as the sun sets, other times, it won’t be until well into the night, the crickets and cicadas shouting their lullabies to each other in the glow of the midnight moon. Until Chanyeol is on the verge of shattering with the need for him. Chanyeol always hears him before he sees him--he hears the dull roar of Kyungsoo’s old pickup truck, the engine sputtering and the tires kicking up the gravel lining their driveway and then, finally, Chanyeol will do the third, last thing, that everyone in town does. He moves. He moves towards Kyungsoo meeting him at the door and pulling him into a tight embrace, the smell of engine oil and metal heavy on the other man’s skin.

 

“Did you miss me?”

 

“Always. Every time.”

 

There’s the soft pull then, and a press. The feeling of Kyungsoo pulling Chanyeol all the way in, his chest bumping up against Chanyeol’s own, and the warm press of Kyungsoo’s mouth against Chanyeol’s. And there’s the lingering yearning that always runs thick through Chanyeol’s body, the desperate longing to make the kiss last, to find someway to push his entire self into Kyungsoo’s chest, so that he could finally find a way into Kyungsoo’s heart.

 

But instead, the moment always breaks, Kyungsoo drawing away and leaving Chanyeol breathless.

 

\---

 

Chanyeol first saw Kyungsoo on the first day of his junior year of high school.

 

No one new ever came to their town, Chanyeol’s mother had always said that people in their town were either unlucky enough to be born there or fortunate enough to die. There was no inbetween. His mother had been one of the lucky ones. She’d died the year before, leaving Chanyeol alone to fend for himself.

 

So when Kyungsoo had shown up in the dim hallways of their high school, everyone eyed him skeptically. Cliques had been solidified since elementary school and friendships were based on family relationships that went back generations. Kyungsoo was tiny and quiet and different. Chanyeol’s classmates largely left Kyungsoo alone. And he largely kept to himself; sitting alone at lunch, staying off to the side during gym class. Other students whispered about how he was always glaring --like he was warning them to stay away. And they did. All of them. Except for Chanyeol.

 

“You’re new, right?”

 

Chanyeol slid into the seat next to him at Kyungsoo’s empty lunch table.

 

Kyungsoo looked up at him, his eyebrows raised skeptically.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“I’m Chanyeol.”

 

“Kyungsoo.”

 

“Um--”

 

“You don’t have to sit with me. You can go back to your real friends.”

 

“I don’t have any. Friends, I mean. No one wants to hang out with me.”

 

“And that’s because…?”

 

“People here don’t like different. I’m the only Asian kid here, I’m as different as it gets. Well. I was. Until you showed up. ”

 

“And you do? You like different?”

 

“Maybe. I think I could. I just know what it feels like to be the odd one out.”

 

Kyungsoo finally smiled. A small smile. “I guess you do.”

 

Chanyeol stuck around after that, the two of them together but never close. It always felt like Kyungsoo was holding Chanyeol away at an arm’s distance. Over the rest of their time in high school, Chanyeol tried his best to inch himself closer to Kyungsoo to pick at his walls until the other boy started to shed his layers. He found out that Kyungsoo had moved to their tiny town after his last foster family had given up on him. That his case worker had sent him to live with one of the families in town--the one that owned the three gas stations that lined the main road. That his new family never spared him a single glance, that they never spoke to him except to order him around. That despite all that, they still expected him to help around the gas station’s body shop. Chanyeol found out that Kyungsoo liked music more than anything, that in some alternate universe where everything is a little bit easier and a little bit brighter, he’d be a singer. Chanyeol found out that Kyungsoo’s eyes never lingered on any of the pretty blonde girls in their year, instead, he was far more likely to stare as the football team ran their warm up laps around the field, their shirtless chests heaving with each breath. And somewhere caught between the overlapping edges of each simple discovery, Chanyeol learned the most important and the most urgent something. He learned something about himself. That his own eyes were always drawn to Kyungsoo. And Kyungsoo only.

 

It made sense for the two of them to move in together after they graduated. They had no one else. Kyungsoo drove one box--cardboard, battered at the corners--over to the one level bungalow that Chanyeol’s mother had left him. He parked his truck in the driveway and let himself in, standing in the dimly lit entryway, box in his arms, the tilt of his head saying simply _I’m here_.

 

“And I’m so glad that you are.”

\---

Chanyeol is lying shirtless on the floor of their tiny bedroom, the skin on his naked back sticking to the rough grain of the wood floorboards. He can feel the slow trickle of sweat as beads slid their way down the curve of his jaw and his entire body _crawled_ with the discomfort of the humidity pressing in on his skin. He stares blankly at the old metal fan spinning up on the ceiling, stirring up the hot, late night air in a defiant but useless effort. It’s too hot for fans. Chanyeol groans and brings a hand up to his forehead, swiping at the sweat sodden bangs hanging limply into his eyes.

 

“Are you dying down there?”

 

Chanyeol groans again and kicks out at the boxspring. The bed barely jolts.

  


“Kicking at the bed isn’t going to make you feel any cooler.” There’s movement up above and then Chanyeol sees Kyungsoo’s face peek over the edge of the bed, his eyes wide behind his glasses.

 

“It’s so fucking hot, I can barely breathe,” Chanyeol whines. Somehow, Kyungsoo still has a t-shirt on.

 

Kyungsoo raises one eyebrow at him.

 

“You’re being dramatic.”

 

“I am not!” Chanyeol sits up and places his folded arms on the edge of bed. “You know that something is fucked up when it’s eleven thirty at night and it’s still ninety degrees outside.” He peeks up at Kyungsoo through his bangs. “How are you not suffering?”

 

Kyungsoo sighs and pushes his glasses up his nose. “I am hot.” He sits back against the wall. “The a/c needs to be fixed. We’ve needed to fix it all summer.”

  


Chanyeol whines and buries his face into the crook of his arms. He feels like his entire body is going to melt.

 

“Alright.” The bed shifts and then Chanyeol feels Kyungsoo slide down onto the floor next to him, his knees knocking against Chanyeol’s own.

 

“You’re hot. I’m hot.” Kyungsoo pokes at the top of Chanyeol’s head until he looks up from his arms. “Let’s sleep down here tonight.”

 

Chanyeol watches as Kyungsoo pulls the pillows down from the bed and lays them out of the floor. Kyungsoo lays down and motions for Chanyeol to do the same.

 

“Is this supposed to help?” Chanyeol joins him and turns so that he’s facing Kyungsoo. He sees the other man shrug.

 

“It probably won’t help. But at least I won’t have to deal with you banging into the bed.”

 

Chanyeol grins at him.

  


It’s only been one month since they’d graduated from high school. One month of actually, really, officially living together. The transition had been easy--Kyungsoo permanently fitting into Chanyeol’s life with the same quiet ease that had drawn the two of them together in high school. Everything about living together just made _sense_. It made sense that the two of them, ignored and forgotten, would make a space of their own, a safe place of their own in a town that would try to scrub the stretch of their shadows from the pavement if it could.

 

Kyungsoo shifts so that he’s laying on his back. He exhales in one long breath, his cheeks puffing out, and his lips rounded into a perfect “o”.

 

They lay there like that; two bodies pressed against the floor. The room is silent, aside from the soft whirl of the fan struggling on the ceiling, the soft rasp of their breaths, and the dulled sound of the crickets chirping outside. Heat rises in gentle waves from their skin and mingles in the air in front of them.

 

“Something on your mind?” Chanyeol asks, finally.

 

Kyungsoo lets out a flat hum.

 

“It’s nothing new.”

 

“Then tell me about whatever old thing you’re thinking about.”

 

“This town is trying to kill me.”

 

Chanyeol reaches over and places on hand on Kyungsoo’s arm.

 

“I know.”

 

“It always feels like everyone I see is trying to find a way to figure me out. Like they don’t get how a gay Asian kid could end up in their tiny perfect little town, like they’re trying to find a way to get rid of me so they can return to their own fucked up idea of normalcy.”

 

“It’s not just you, you know. They’re like that to me too. I told you. They don’t like different here.”

 

Kyungsoo exhales again. He takes off his glasses and puts them on the ground next to his head.

 

“I know. And I’m so goddamn tired of being different. Fuck.”

  


They lay there in silence.

 

“Sometimes I wish I could run away,” Kyungsoo starts up again, after a while. “Just get in my truck and drive until the gas runs out. And then fill the tank back up, get in, and start all over again.”

 

“Where do you want to go?”

 

“I have no fucking clue. Just anywhere that’s not this shit town.”

 

“Why don’t you leave then?”

 

“I can’t. What’s going to happen to you if I do?”

 

Chanyeol’s heart stutters. He can’t tell if it’s because Kyungsoo can’t leave him behind or if it’s because Kyungsoo would never think to take him with him.

 

Kyungsoo is quiet after that.

 

“No one here has ever seen me as human. Seen _us_ as human.” Kyungsoo turns so that he’s facing Chanyeol again. “No one here ever wanted us, ever accepted us. But they still expect me to fix their goddamn cars and smile at them in the street when they say all sorts of gross shit about the two of us--about how we’re too _foreign_ , too _weird_ , too _different_.” He coughs out a laugh. “It’s always been this way. This whole place needs to burn the fuck down.”

 

Kyungsoo’s face is tight, it’s always tight. Chanyeol doesn’t think he’s ever seen him any other way.

 

Chanyeol reaches over and places a hand on Kyungsoo’s chest. He can feel the rapid race of Kyungsoo’s heart under his palm.

 

Kyungsoo parts his lips and looks at Chanyeol, staring straight into his eyes.

 

“It’s too hot for this, Chanyeol.”

 

Chanyeol bends over and kisses Kyungsoo anyways, pressing his lips to the pulse point in the other man’s neck. Kyungsoo sighs and presses his head back into the pillow. Chanyeol sucks at his pulse, tasting the salt of his sweat and feeling Kyungsoo’s blood run hot under his skin. Kyungsoo threads his fingers through Chanyeol’s hair.

 

“Whatever you want, Kyungsoo,” Chanyeol whispers into his skin. He slides his hands under Kyungsoo’s shirt, running his fingers over the jutting ridges of the other man’s ribs. “Whatever it is. You want to run away, I’ll pack your bags for you. You want to burn down the entire town, I’ll strike the first match. Just don’t leave me behind, ok? I’m always being left behind.”

 

He feels, more than hears, Kyungsoo’s quiet hum of affirmation.

 

“Ok.”

  
  


\---

It’s drizzling tonight.

 

But Kyungsoo still drives with all the windows down, speeding down the deserted dirt lane. He doesn’t turn on the radio--not tonight--choosing instead to let the sound of the rain pitter-patter against the windshield, and letting the raindrops sting their cheeks in cold, wet bites. Kyungsoo doesn’t say anything, he just keeps his eyes trained straight ahead, hands gripping the steering wheel, mouth set tight.

 

Kyungsoo pulls off the main road and drives up to an old wooden house the paint shining gray in the harsh shine of the headlights. He stops and parks the car off to the side of the house, the empty lot full of knee high summer weeds.

 

Kyungsoo kills the engine. “Nothing will catch tonight.”

 

“Then why are we here?”

 

He opens the door and gets out into the rain. Chanyeol fumbles with his seat belt and follows him, the wet grass itching at his exposed calves.

 

Kyungsoo is quiet. He has his arms crossed over his chest, curling in tighter and closer on himself, making his body seem even more compact. Chanyeol watches him: watches the way he tilts his head up towards the night sky, his eyes wide open despite the falling rain;watches the way the rain turns his white shirt translucent, the curve and fall of his shoulders and chest outlined in soft cotton; watches the way he bites his bottom lip, his brow furrowed in...concentration? confusion? anger?; watches the way he breathes, slow and deep.

 

“I just want to be out in the rain.” Kyungsoo doesn’t look at Chanyeol, but instead goes around to the back of the truck and climbs into the bed. He stands there for a moment and then says: “come on.”

 

Chanyeol follows him and hoists himself up. He stands there for a moment, next to Kyungsoo and then Kyungsoo lays down on his back. Wordlessly, Chanyeol follows, laying down on the cold bed, the wet of the fallen rain soaking through his shirt and the rough patches of rust rubbing up against his back. Chanyeol closes his eyes.

 

They stay like that for a while. The rain falls against their faces, the rich smells of wet earth and old damp wood mingling in the air and rising up to meet them. The nights feels cool and gentle on Chanyeol’s skin.

 

“Sometimes all I want is for the rain to come and wash me away.”

 

Chanyeol opens his eyes. He looks at Kyungsoo and sees that the other man is facing him, his wide eyes steady on Chanyeol’s face. Their faces are so close.

 

“Where do you want it to take you?” Chanyeol reaches out and runs a finger over the slope of Kyungsoo’s left cheek. His skin is so warm.

 

“Somewhere different. Anywhere. I can’t take this town any more, Chanyeol.”

 

Chanyeol’s finger drifts over to the soft pout of Kyungsoo’s lips. He presses down, softly, and Kyungsoo opens his mouth, just a bit, and Chanyeol lets the tip of his finger slip inside. Kyungsoo’s mouth is hot, like he had swallowed the fire they had come out to set. Kyungsoo takes Chanyeol’s finger deeper, letting his tongue follow the swirl of Chanyeol’s fingerprint. Chanyeol catches his breath in the back of his throat and then pulls his finger away, replacing it instead with his own mouth, seeking out the fullness of Kyungsoo’s lips with his own.

 

Chanyeol inhales from Kyungsoo’s mouth, trying to carry some of the other man’s heat into his own lungs, trying to stave off the chill leaking into his bones from the cold of the truck bed. Kyungsoo sighs and presses into Chanyeol, chest to chest, his hand coming up to cup the side of Chanyeol’s jaw, his leg swinging around to hook itself over Chanyeol’s waist. Chanyeol feels himself pushing the kiss from something gentle towards something rougher, more desperate. He tangles his fingers in Kyungsoo’s thick hair, he pushes his hips against Kyungsoo’s own, seeking out more friction.

 

Kyungsoo grips at the muscles in Chanyeol’s back and kisses him back, just as hard, and grinds against him, just as hard, and Chanyeol gasps.

 

Somehow, Chanyeol ends up flat on his back again, with Kyungsoo straddling his lap. Chanyeol looks up at him, tries to make out the details in his appearance in the darkness and sees the outline of his hair, mussed from their frantic kissing; sees the way Kyungsoo’s shirt is soaked through and pressed flat against his skin. Chanyeol places both hands on the rise of Kyungsoo’s ass and pulls his forward, just slightly, so that he’s sitting just above Chanyeol’s crotch. Kyungsoo leans down again and presses wet, open mouth kisses on to Chanyeol’s neck, alternating between using his lips, teeth, and tongue. Chanyeol cries out and his hands find their way back to Kyungsoo’s rain-soaked hair.

 

“Can I come with you?” Chanyeol gasps out. “When the rain washes you away?”

 

Kyungsoo hums against his skin.

 

“If you want,” he says. “But if you don’t want to get separated, then you’re gonna have to hold on to me.”

 

“That’s what I’m always trying to do.”

  


\---

 

They go back two weeks later.

 

It’s a clear, but moonless night, and when Chanyeol glances up at the sky, he can see what feels like a million stars. It makes his breath catch in his throat.

 

Kyungsoo doesn’t waste any time unloading the truck. He takes the jugs of gasoline out of the bed, handing one off to Chanyeol without a single word. His face is the same as it always is on nights like these--mouth set firm, eyes gone wide. Expressionless. Kyungsoo goes towards the house, uncapping the jug before he even reaches the worn wood of the balcony. He hops up the splintering steps and sloshes gas over the boarded up door and over the railings. Chanyeol stands a ways back and watches the way Kyungsoo’s shoulder muscles strain against the fabric of his shirt each time he swung the jug around. Chanyeol tries to unclog his lungs and takes two deep breaths, trying to suck as much of the summer night air as he can into his body. Instead, he gags and coughs on the acrid smell of the gas mixing with the old wood.

 

Kyungsoo looks at him then.

 

“You coming?”

 

Chanyeol nods and then realizes that Kyungsoo probably can’t see him. “Yeah.”

 

Chanyeol hefts the container up and stumbles over to the back of the house, dousing the crumbling siding. Some of the gas bounces backwards and splashes on to his sneakers, soaking into the canvas. The smell is unbearable.

 

Chanyeol empties the last of his jug and then goes over to the balcony where Kyungsoo is standing in the yard, his own jug hanging limply from his left hand. He hands a box of long stemmed matches to Chanyeol.

 

“Set it?”

 

Chanyeol takes the matches from Kyungsoo and then walks up to the balcony. He strikes a match against the side of the box, listening to scratch and hiss of the top taking light. He steps right up to the deteriorating bottom step, dripping with gasoline, and drops the match, jumping back just as the flames burst into a maelstrom.

 

The scent of burning wood, old paint, and gasoline is one that Chanyeol knows he will never get used to, and his eyes water and lungs burn. He coughs again and again and then takes a deep breath, one and then another, but the air is thick with the particles of their executed revenge.

 

He stumbles and he feels a hand on grabbing the collar of his t-shirt, yanking him backwards, away from the house. He collides with Kyungsoo’s body, his back to his chest, and Chanyeol takes another breath, the air still stinging his lungs. Kyungsoo pulls Chanyeol back to the car, where Chanyeol collapses across the hood of the car, gasping. His lungs are tight and his head is swirling, everything moving faster and faster, too fast for him to grasp onto one solid thought and follow it to its completion. There’s a burst of heat to his left where the house shimmered behind a curtain of flames, orange and red and gold burning brightly enough to dim the stars up above. Chanyeol rolls over, splays out on the hood, his back against the metal of the car, and looks up at the sky, the stars blurring in the tears in his eyes. He squeezes his eyes shut and takes another breath, the air heavy with the smell of smoke and gasoline. He feels a touch ghost over his cheek and blinks his eyes open. Kyungsoo is leaning over him, his mouth expressionless but an unmistakable tenderness glinting in his eyes. He rubs his thumb over the tear tracks racing down Chanyeol’s cheeks and Chanyeol grabs at Kyungsoo’s hand, pressing Kyungsoo’s palm into his cheek.

 

“Always so emotional.”

 

Chanyeol tries to laugh, a short hacking sound.

 

“Always.”

 

There’s a snap and a crash behind them, as the house starts to buckle under the weight of its own ash and fire.

 

Chanyeol breathes in again, welcoming the smoke and sting. Anything if it will let him keep Kyungsoo’s touch close.

 

Besides, breathing always seems to come a little easier when the air is heavy.

 

\---

 

Chanyeol lives for moments like these.

 

When Kyungsoo is pliable in his arms, when he lets Chanyeol hold him tight to his chest, lets Chanyeol kiss him, really kiss him, the way he wants to.

 

When Kyungsoo lets himself fall open for Chanyeol. When Kyungsoo lets Chanyeol push inside him and sink into his heat. And Kyungsoo is always so hot, like Chanyeol’s touch lit a fire inside of him.

 

Kyungsoo is gentler in these moments, softer. He gasps out Chanyeol’s name with a quiet desperation, and curls his limbs around Chanyeol’s body, pulling him closer, grabbing at his back, sucking Chanyeol’s exhaled breath into his own lungs.

  


He acts like he wants Chanyeol there, like he needs him. And when Kyungsoo crests and cums, Chanyeol knows that it was because of him. Only him.

  
  


\---

 

“Are you ready?”

 

Chanyeol looks over his shoulder and sees Kyungsoo walk back towards the truck. He tosses the empty gas container into the bed where it lands amongst their boxes and suitcases. Kyungsoo leans against the car and watches.

 

Chanyeol flicks the lighter, once, twice, watching the controlled light bloom in front of him, watching the flame flicker on and off.

 

“Yeah.” Chanyeol flicks the lighter on one more time and then bends down towards the railing of their front porch. He touches the flame to the gas soaked wood and in a hot flash, their house catches ablaze.

 

He tosses the lighter onto the porch and steps backwards, watching the fire grow, the flames leering at him like infernal teeth as they gnaw up the sides of his childhood home, consuming the entire structure.

 

He feels two arms circle around his waist and Kyungsoo pushes his face into the curve of Chanyeol’s spine. Kyungsoo’s body is so warm in the late August night.

 

The heat from the burning house makes Chanyeol squint and makes his skin ache. But he doesn’t pull away. Instead, he stands there, caught between the twin fevers of the burning house and Kyungsoo’s body.

 

“How do you feel?” Kyungsoo’s lips move against the jut of Chanyeol’s vertebrae.

 

“Hot.”

 

Kyungsoo’s arms tighten around him, briefly, and then he lets go, pulling away. The sudden empty space behind Chanyeol feels like winter air.

 

“Let’s go.” Kyungsoo opens the driver side door of the truck and gets in, starting the engine. Chanyeol stands in the driveway for a moment longer, taking one last look at their house shimmering on its pyre. Then he turns and gets in the truck, slamming the door behind him.

 

Kyungsoo backs out and speeds away, the tires skidding out on the gravel. A tiny thought registers in the back of Chanyeol’s head, telling him that this is the last time he’ll ever hear the tires crunch on the driveway. He’s not sure how that makes him feel.

 

The roads are deserted. They always are.

 

Kyungsoo asks him again. “Are you ready?” He doesn’t take his eyes off the road.

 

“Yeah.”

 

Chanyeol’s still not sure how he feels. He folds his arms and leans against the window and catches the glow of the burning house in the side view mirror. He watches the only thing in town that he’d ever had a claim on, the only physical testament of his existence in a place that never made space for him. What had any of it really mattered in the end.

 

He looks over at Kyungsoo, at the way his hair falls into his eyes, at the firm set of his lips, at the way he grips the steering wheel, like it’s his only lifeline. And Chanyeol feels his heart pound in his chest.

 

“Where are we going?” He asks.

 

“Wherever the car takes us.”

 

Chanyeol holds on to the way the last word sounds slipping out of Kyungsoo’s mouth. _Us_.

 

All along that’s what Chanyeol has really wanted. That’s all he’d been hoping for. For Kyungsoo to let him in. For Kyungsoo to choose him.

 

And, maybe, that’s all that really matters. Maybe that’s all that love really is, all that desire, all that need really is and will ever really be. Maybe it’s not the beginning or the middle of the love that matters, but instead just the end and how brilliantly the last light will shine. How brightly, how _hot_ the last fire will burn. Maybe Chanyeol’s only thing, his only part to play in this wild, painful, scary love is to be tinder for the last fire, be air for the last gasp. And if Kyungsoo brought the gasoline to his lips, Chanyeol would gladly drink; if Kyungsoo touched the lit match to his skin, Chanyeol would easily press into it.  Maybe all that matters--has ever mattered-- is for Chanyeol to burn.

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> This is (very, very) loosely based on this Washington Post [article](http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/style/2014/04/09/love-and-fire/?utm_term=.68f9ca689ec7). There’s a book too, “American Fire”, but I haven’t gotten around to reading it just yet. But it’s a dark and deeply fascinating story, so if you’re interested, definitely check out the article, at least.
> 
> This is probably the weirdest thing I’ve ever written (aside from that one eunhae fic I wrote like...almost a decade ago) so if you made it this far then: 1) I’m super surprised and 2) I’ll be super, SUPER surprised if you didn’t completely hate this. But if you did make it this far then, THANK YOU.
> 
> This time, I leave you with these songs:
> 
> [What It Is To Burn](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLbHfOhJNR4)\- Finch (from which I stole the title for this fic).
> 
> [The Good Side](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ay4S61byZo)\- Troye Sivan
> 
> [Too Fast](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZmPZDySFMI)-Sonder
> 
> [9+1#](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLeM5jOsgD0)\- Jaejoong
> 
> [All We Do](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hk478sN-oZY)\- Kaytranada (ft. JMSN)
> 
>    
> Let me know if you liked this (or if you hated it or whatever).
> 
> If you're bored (or want to chat or creep on me), hit me up on [tumblr](https://transparent-umbrellla.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/intensencounter).


End file.
